Overall Orange alert Tropical Cyclone for BELAL-24
in Miscellaneous (French) Indian Ocean Islands, Mauritius, Madagascar

Event summary

Tropical Cyclone BELAL-24 can have a medium humanitarian impact based on the maximum sustained wind speed, exposed population and vulnerability.

GDACS ID TC 1001041
Name BELAL-24
From - To 12 Jan - 19 Jan
Exposed countries Miscellaneous (French) Indian Ocean Islands, Mauritius, Madagascar
Exposed population 960 thousand in Category 1 or higher
Maximum wind speed 158 km/h Category 2
Maximum storm surge 0.3 m (15 Jan 22:00 UTC)
Vulnerability Medium (Reunion)

GDACS Score

For more info on GDACS alert score click here.
Wind Storm surge Rainfall GDACS score
WMO-RSMC La Réunion 63 km/h 0.3 m n.a. 0.5
GDACS JTWC 65 km/h n.a. n.a. 0.5
Single TC: maximum expected impact (wind, storm surge, rainfall)
HWRF 173 km/h 0.7 m 1812 mm 1.5
GFS 155 km/h 0.7 m 768 mm 1.5
ECMWF 94 km/h 0.6 m 781 mm 0.5
Maximum expected impact (wind, storm surge and rainfall) using different data sources.
Virtual OSOCC
Meteo assessment
Satellite products
Analytical products
BELAL-24 - EC/ECHO daily mapMon, 15 Jan 2024 18:44

A new EC/ECHO daily map is now available
Reunion, Mauritius - Tropical cyclone BELAL, update (ECHO 16 Jan 2024)Tue, 16 Jan 2024 12:30

  • Tropical cyclone BELAL made landfall over the north-eastern Reunion and passed over the eastern area of the Island in the morning (UTC) of 15 January, with maximum sustained winds up to 169 km/h. On 16 January at 6.00 UTC its centre was located over the Indian Ocean 360 km south-east of Reunion, with maximum sustained winds of 114 km/h (tropical storm).
  • Media report, as of 16 January, two fatalities and four injured people. 
  • BELAL is expected to continue south-east over the Ocean on 16-19 January, weakening but remaing a tropical storm.
  • Over the next 24 hours, more rainfall and strong winds are still forecast over most of Reunion, in particular over the central and southern areas. The red alert (the third level out of four) for cyclone issued by Meteo France La Reunion over the whole Island is still in force. More rainfall is also forecast over the whole Mauritius on 16 January.
Reunion, Mauritius - Tropical cyclone BELAL, update (ECHO 17 Jan 2024)Wed, 17 Jan 2024 10:40

  • The passage of the tropical cyclone BELAL over Reunion on 15 January in the morning (UTC) caused casualties and severe damage. Media reports, as of 17 January, three fatalities across the Island. In addition, one more fatality was reported across Mauritius.
  • On 17 January at 6.00 UTC its centre was located over the Indian Ocean approximately 835 km south-east of Reunion, with maximum sustained winds of 106 km/h (tropical storm).
  • BELAL is expected to continue south-east over the Ocean on 17 January and after that to turn south-west on 18 January, weakening into a tropical depression on 20 January.
  • The Copernicus Emergency Management Service () was activated in rapid mapping mode on 15 January to provide the damage assessment for Reunion.
  • Over the next 72 hours, no more rainfall and strong winds are forecast over Reunion and Mauritius.
Detailed event map. European Union, 2024. Map produced by EC-JRC.
The boundaries and the names shown on this map do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by the European Union.

Updates on volcanic activity (Smithsonian)

Latest media headlines

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Estimated casualties (PAGER)

USGS estimates the number of casualties for each earthquake for the Prompt Assessment of Global Earthquakes for Response (PAGER) product.
The graph shows the current fatalities estimate.

Exposed population

Data, images, links, services and documents

For this events, GDACS has links to information from the following sources: EC-JRC (40), (2), INFORM (2),